The mission statement of Bilibili, often dubbed “China’s YouTube”, stands out for its modesty. Instead of promising to change the world, the firm aspires merely to “enrich the everyday life of young generations in China”. If user figures are a guide, the Chinese young feel enriched. In the last quarter of 2020 the number of people who used the service at least once a month shot up by half from a year earlier, to 202m. Nearly nine in ten were under the age of 35. Videos on the platform, which range from sports highlights to self-help lectures and everything in between, attract an average of 1.2bn daily views.
B站常被称为“中国版油管”，而其企业宣言却以谦逊低调而备受瞩目。B站从未放出豪言要改变世界，只希望“丰富中国年轻一代的日程生活”。但从用户数据来看，中国年轻人的确因此而充实。在2020年的最后一个季度，B站的月活跃用户量相比一年前猛增50%，达到了2.02亿。将近90%的用户年龄在35岁以下。B站平台上的视频类型应有尽有，从体育赛事集锦到有关自救的讲座，日均观看量达到12亿次。
Launched in 2009 as a website for fans of Japanese anime, Bilibili has evolved into a diversified entertainment group. In recent months even Western musicians (such as Jessie J and Charlie Puth) and Hollywood stars (including Dwayne Johnson) have rushed to set up Bilibili accounts. Investors, too, have taken notice. Between March 2018, when the firm listed in New York, and February this year its market capitalisation rose more than tenfold, to $41bn. On March 23rd it raised $2.6bn in a secondary listing in Hong Kong.
2009年推出的B站当时只是一个面向日本动漫迷的网站，现已发展成为多元化的娱乐集团。近几个月来，甚至连西方音乐家（如婕西和查理·普思）和好莱坞明星（包括道恩·强森）都争先恐后地开设了B站账户。投资者也注意到了这一点。从2018年3月在纽约上市到今年2月，B站市值增长了10倍多，达到410亿美元。3月23日，B站在香港的二次上市中筹集了26亿美元。
Unlike YouTube, Bilibili refuses to clutter usergenerated videos with adverts. That way, the thinking goes, it can attract new users put off by such interruptions, and convince them to spend more time on the platform. The central aim, as described by executives, is to “convert” this “sticky community” into “paying users”.
与油管不同的是，B站拒绝在用户发布的视频中添加广告。这样做的理念是，可以吸引对干扰广告反感的新用户，并说服他们在B站上花更多的时间。正如高管们所言，B站的核心目标是将“粘性群体”转化为“付费用户”。
